Environmental service laboratories Report shows strong growth had
ByNrmcyE. pfund The laboratories discussed in this article play a major role in the implementation of environmental regulations. For example, EPA uses competitive bidding to contract out analyses required by regulatory mandate. In fiscal 1985, EPA ordered about 100,ooO gas chromatography-mass spectrometry tests for Superfund and dioxin programs alone. Environmental service laboratories are increasingly useful to private sector clients, and they constitute the majority of a large laboratory’s business. They act as environmental accountants by providing clients with objective, tbirdparty chemical information. Oftenit is too expensive for companies to a c q h data in a way that meets complice standards. In addition, such companyderived data often are of qnestionable objectivity in the eyes of the court. Last year, the market for environmental service laboratories in the United States was estimated to be $250 million (1). I predict that environmental service laboratories should be an active markel in the next five years. In the past, environmental service laboratories were usually small, private shops that drew their business from local or regional governmentsand corporations. Now environmental service laboratories are becoming an established industry (see box). This report looks at typical labs and points out that two of the companies have been public for a few years and that three went public in 1985. Many others have since followed suit, including TRC Companies, Inc. The six laboratories listed in the box have participated at varions levels and times in the EPA contract l a b tory program and in related federal or state contracts. The exacting standards of the EPA program give puticipating labs a kind of seal of approval that helps tbem in establishing reputations for providing quality service. The largest stand-alone environmental service laboratory is Enseco. The
I Nancy E. pfund
A sampling of publically held envlronmental service laboratories CompuChem C o p (Research Triangle Park, N.C.) Enseco, Inc. (Berkeley Heights, N.J.) Environmental 7ieaYment and Tec‘ nologies Cop. (Findlay, Ohio) International Technology Cop. (lei, ance, Calif.) Thermo Analytical, Inc. (Waltham,
I
Mass.) TRC Companies, Inc. (East Hartfor Conn.)
company went public in June 1985, in 1986 it acquired two regionallabs: California Analytical Laboratories, Inc. (Sacramento) and Rocky Mountain Analytical Laboratory (Denver). Enseco perhaps is exemplary of the business of environmental service laboratories. The company’s business embraces the full range of analytical and consulting servicesrelated to hazardous-wastedisposal. Clients include EPA, state and other federal regulators, engineering companies, and major corporations such as Allied, Du Pont, and General Electric. One of the oldest companies that also provides environmental service laboratory capabilities is International lkchnology. This company went public in December 1983 and provides capabilities in four areas: analytical services; engineering services; decontaminstion
M113936XJ87~1085151.5010 0 1987 American Chemical society
and remedial services; and hansprtation, treatment, and disposal services. The first three services are provided nationwide for toxic substances and lowlevel nuclear-cbemical waste areas; the fourth service is confined to the western United States and to chemical (not nuclear) wastes. Although International Technology is a larger corporationthan Enseco, its business includes many nodabomtory elements, as described above. Thermo Analytical serves two markets: environmental analytical services and health physics, which monitors and protects against radioactive e x p u r e . Its principal labs are in Albuquerque, N. M.,and Richmond, Calif. Formerly this company was a subsidiary of Thermo Electron COT. The other two laboratories are CompuChem and Environmental ’Reahnent and ’khnologies Copration (ETTC). In addition to its environmental business, CompuChem also has an active business for testing drugs that are abused. ElTC began as an analytical laboratory, but following a 1986 merger with OH Materials the company has become a leader in testing and remediation services. S i l y , TRC Companies started out as an environmental engineering consulting firm but, through acquisitions and internal development, it is on its way to becoming a full-service analytical and remediation company Reference (1) Pfund, N. E. “TheQuielRevolutioa: Ana-
lytical Instrumentation Extends Its Reach”; Hambrecht & Quist, Inc.: San Francisso, April 1986; Vols. I and 11.
Nancy E. pfund is
a chemical technology analyst at Hambrecht & Quist andfollows the enviromntal service industq Previously she worked as a c m l r a n t to the ollqornia Department of Health Senices in the toxic substance area and in governmental afairs at Intel Gnporatwn. She h0ldF B.A. and M.A. degrees from Stanfod University and an MBA from the a l e School of Management. Envimn. Sei. Technd.. MI. 21, No. 10,1987 951
